Saving Seafood

2020 US Pacific cod catch may be lowest since 1983, could drop further

December 18, 2018 — The eastern Bering Sea (EBS) Pacific cod catch could drop again in 2021 and 2022, as scientific forecasts indicate 2020 could see the lowest federal total allowable catch (TAC) since the early-1980s, according to an Undercurrent News analysis of government scientific data.

Data presented in the 2018 stock assessment report from Grant Thompson, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) scientist and an expert on the cod fishery, suggests the TAC will bottom out in 2022 and then increase again. However, new models to be developed in 2019 will include alternative methods of accounting for the increased biomass in the northern Bering Sea (NBS) and could see this bleak outlook improve.

In 2018, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) has indicated the federal TAC in 2020 could be cut to 124,625 metric tons, compared to 166,475t in 2019 and 188,136t this year. The TAC for 2019 has been recommended by NPFMC at the meeting in Anchorage, Alaska, last week, but the 2020 level is only provisional and will be reviewed next year in light of new data. The NPFMC went with Thompson’s number for 2019, not a lower one from a team of scientists who take into account the stock assessment report.

Then, Thompson’s report gives various projections for female spawning biomass and catches through 2030. The first is the most relevant, however, he said.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

BOSTON HERALD: Wind farms, fishing industry must co-exist

December 17, 2018 — A new report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has highlighted the enormous impact of the fishing industry on the Massachusetts economy, with New Bedford topping the list of highest-value ports in the entire United States with a whopping $389 million worth of seafood landed in 2017. The report also highlights that fishing supports 87,000 jobs in the commonwealth, second nationally only to California, a much more populous state.

This data could not come at a more critical time for New England’s fishermen, who are raising concerns about how new wind farms will impact marine life in the area. While reducing the state’s carbon footprint is a noble goal, the heavily taxpayer-subsidized wind projects have yet to prove themselves reliable and effective in the marketplace and come with a host of unanswered questions about the costs and long-term environmental outcome.

Read the full editorial at the Boston Herald

Dogfish harvest to stay same in ’19 as fishermen seek market

December 14, 2018 –Federal ocean managers are allowing the same level of harvest of smooth dogfish, a small species of shark that members of the East Coast seafood industry have tried to find a market for.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says the smooth dogfish quota will be a little less than 4 million pounds in 2019. That’s the same as this year and the previous year.

Despite the steady size of the quota, fishermen harvested less than a quarter of it this year. Members of the seafood industry have tried marketing dogfish to U.S. consumers, but it remains an uncommon menu item.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

 

US commercial fishermen take their aquaculture concerns to Capitol Hill

December 14, 2018 — Commercial fishermen and their supporters let Congress know where they stand on a bill that would grant NOAA Fisheries the ability to regulate aquaculture operations in federal waters.

The letter, signed by 100 fishermen and supporters and sent to elected officials last week, claims each fish farm in the exclusive enterprise zone would restrict access to “hundreds of acres of marine space” to commercial fishermen. They also believe fish farms would produce lower-cost and lower-quality fish, which they believe would deter consumers from paying more for wild fish. Further, the letter raises concerns about the impact that farmed fish escapes and pollution stemming from fish feed and antibiotics might have on fishing stocks.

“Simply put, industrial seafood farms threaten the integrity of the wild fish populations that are key to our industry’s success, and the coastal communities we support,” the letter states.

In July, U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Mississippi) filed the Advancing the Quality and Understanding of American Aquaculture (AQUAA) Act to give NOAA Fisheries power to permit aquaculture activities within the country’s exclusive enterprise zone. In September, U.S. Reps. Steven Palazzo (R-Mississippi) and Collin Peterson (D-Minnesota) introduced a companion bill in the House.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

 

Fishing crew charged with shark fin trafficking

December 12, 2018 — The owner and officers of a Japanese-flagged fishing vessel were charged in federal court Tuesday with aiding and abetting the trafficking and smuggling of nearly 1,000 shark fins into and out of Hawaii last month.

During a year-long tuna-fishing expedition, the crew of a Japanese fishing boat —the M.V. Kyoshin Maru No. 20 — allegedly harvested fins from about 300 sharks, at least some species of which are protected under the Endangered Species Act and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species.

One of those species, the oceanic white tip shark, has declined in population by about 80-95 percent across the Pacific Ocean since the mid-1990s, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

According to a U.S. Department of Justice press release, the crew cut the shark fins off, “in some instances while the sharks were stunned but still alive, and discarded the finless carcasses into the ocean,” all under the supervision of the captain and at the direction of the ship’s officers.

The illegally-harvested fins were discovered in the luggage of 10 Indonesian nationals, who had been employed as fishermen on the boat. The Indonesian fishermen had been dropped off from the fishing boat at a port in Honolulu and were intending to catch a flight to Jakarta.

Read the full story at The Garden Island

Bradley Byrne applauds NOAA’s increased Red Snapper catch limit under new rule

December 12, 2018 — Congressman Bradley Byrne, R-Montrose, applauded a new NOAA Fisheries rule to increase the annual catch limits and annual catch targets for the Red Snapper fishery in the Gulf of Mexico.

“This increase from NOAA shows exactly what those of us on the Gulf Coast have known for years: the health of the Red Snapper fishery is incredibly strong,” Representative Byrne said. “These latest numbers will further drive us to continue fighting for greater state control over the Red Snapper fishery and a full and adequate Red Snapper fishing season.”

The commercial annual catch limit would increase from 7.007 million pounds to 7.701 million pounds. The annual recreational charter boat catch limit would increase from 2.848 million pounds to 3.13 million pounds. The annual recreational private boat limit would increase from 3.885 million pounds to 4.269 million pounds.

The catch limits for Red Snapper are being increased because assessment of Gulf red snapper was completed in 2018 and indicated that red snapper was not overfished or experiencing overfishing, but the stock is still in a rebuilding plan. Based on the assessment, catch limits can be increased. The commercial, recreational, and component ACLs could also be increased.

The proposed rule would also decrease the annual catch limit of West Florida Hogfish from 219,000 pounds to just 129,500 pounds in 2019. It would increase to 141,300 pounds in 2020, and 150,400 pounds in 2021 and beyond.

Read the full story at the Alabama Political Reporter

NORTH CAROLINA: Disaster declaration OK’d for fishing industry storm damage

December 11, 2018 — U.S. Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross on Friday granted Gov. Roy Cooper’s request for a disaster declaration related to damage from Hurricane Florence to North Carolina’s fishing industry.

The storm destroyed boats, gear and buildings critical to fishing businesses.

Cooper requested the declaration in a letter dated Nov. 1, saying federal fisheries disaster assistance was needed for long-term recovery after initial relief from state appropriations. The declaration is a critical step for Congress to appropriate fishery disaster assistance, the governor’s office noted Friday.

“Recreational and commercial fishing are important economic drivers for our state and families along North Carolina’s coast. I appreciate Secretary Ross’s recognition of the damage to these vital industries caused by Hurricane Florence. We must rebuild smarter and stronger than ever and I will continue to work with our federal, state and local partners to bring recovery funds to those who need them,” Cooper said in a statement.

Read the full story at The Outer Banks Voice

JACK SPILLANE: A rogue agency gets set to shut down another New Bedford fishery

December 10, 2018 — Scott Lang has been around fisheries issues for a long time.

Both when he was mayor and afterwards.

In 2013, Lang helped organize the Center for Sustainable Fisheries as a grassroots lobbying group to try to make sure New Bedford fishermen were not totally forgotten by NOAA. He’s worked for the industry for a long time and seen a lot of arguments from both sides back-and-forth over the years.

But until last week, he said he had never seen NOAA make a decision to close a fishery with no science behind it. Not even questionable science, as for years NOAA has used for New England groundfishing limits in the opinion of many.

NOAA’s decision to close the Rose and Crown Zone and Zone D to surf clammers is based on anecdotal evidence related to UMass Dartmouth scientist Kevin Stokesbury’s research for the scallop industry, first done almost two decades ago.

The camera net device Stokesbury invented was for measuring scallop habitats but NOAA has used his science to measure clam beds. It’s not the same, Stokesbury told The Standard-Times. The images his survey produces are of the ocean floor about a kilometer apart and clammers often dredge in much shorter distances.

The clammers have offered to do surveys that will be more applicable to clam beds in the areas of Nantucket Shoals in question. They would need about three years to do that but they would have to keep fishing in the closed areas in order to pay for it.

Read the full opinion piece at the New Bedford Standard-Times

Proposed reduction in herring harvest could affect lobster catch

December 10, 2018 — Fishermen who harvest herring, one of the most important baitfish on the East Coast, are likely to see a dramatic reduction next year in the amount they are allowed to catch. The change could have major implications for the lobster business.

The commercial fishery for herring is a major industry in the Atlantic states, where the small fish is important as lobster bait and is also eaten by people. Herring has been under the microscope of regulators and conservation groups recently after a scientific assessment said earlier this year that the fish’s population has fallen in the past five years.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said it wants to cut the annual catch limit from nearly 110 million pounds this year to less than half that in 2019. The agency said in a statement that the deep cut is needed to prevent overfishing.

This year’s herring quota was also cut back in August. The loss of so much herring will be a challenge for America’s lobstermen, who are based mostly in New England, said Kristan Porter, president of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The Westerly Sun

NOAA report links 70% of US whale deaths to fishing gear entanglements

December 10, 2018 — More than two-thirds (70%) of the 76 whales that were killed after being entangled in US waters in 2017 were caught up in fishing gear, including traps and buoy lines and nets, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) says in its “National Large Whale Entanglement Report” released Thursday.

Most of the rest – 24% — were linked to lines that could not be attributed to a fishery activity, the US regulatory agency noted.

The data could get mentioned frequently as fishing-related regulatory agencies in the US and Canada take an increasingly harder look at how the use of lobster and snow crab traps might be contributing to whale deaths.

NOAA’s report notes that humpback whales accounted for 49 of the 76 whales that were snarled last year. That’s just above the 10-year average of 69.5 whales entangled per year. Gray and minke whales (seven each) were the next largest groups to be entangled.

Just three of the endangered North Atlantic right whales, the source of much of the controversy in the US and Canada, were part of the tally.

The majority of the whales, 33, were discovered on the northeastern US coast, from Maine to Virginia, though it’s not clear that’s where they got entangled in gear.

“Large whales are powerful and mobile. They can town gear with them for long, long distances, so where we observe them is not usually the place they became entangled,” Sarah Wilkin, national stranding and emergency response coordinator at NOAA Fisheries, is quoted by the Asbury Park (New Jersey) Press as saying.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News